Russia to Reno: Tight security measures during Sochi Olympics keep journalists safe without disrupting the Games

8:25 PM,
Mar. 8, 2014

Reno Gazette-Journal reporter Martha Bellisle poses with the Olympic rings at the 2014 Sochi Winter Games. Around her neck can be seen a laminated 4-inch by 8-inch media identification card required at all times and checked regularly. Officers used handheld scanners to verify that the person wearing it was in fact its owner.

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Now that I'm back at work at the RGJ in the United States, it seems like a good time to reveal some of the security measures that were in place at the Sochi Olympics - measures that ensured that everyone attending the Games stayed safe.

I didn't want to share those details while still in Russia for obvious reasons - I didn't want to give the bad guys a glimpse of the plan.

Security was definitely an issue going into the Olympics this year. An extremist group threatened to disrupt the event and had succeeded in October in setting off a bomb on a passenger bus in Volgograd, north of Sochi, killing six ...